Small amount of plutonium missing from Los Alamos

["Sandy Perle" <sandyfl@EARTHLINK.NET>]

Index:



Small amount of plutonium missing from Los Alamos

TEPCO reactivates 2nd reactor in Niigata

FirstEnergy delays nuke test, still sees Aug restart

Laos denies smuggling of radioactive material

Hiroshima peace group to probe depleted uranium arms in Iraq

GAO Releases Radioactive Material Report

AMETEK Licenses Technology for Next-Generation Radiation Detector

=======================================



Small amount of plutonium missing from Los Alamos



SANTA FE, N.M. (Reuters) - The Los Alamos nuclear laboratory said  

Wednesday a small amount of low-grade plutonium turned up missing 

after a transfer of the material that is used to make nuclear bombs, 

but added the missing plutonium does not pose a threat.



"The total amount of nuclear material involved is very small, but due 

to security requirements the specific quantity cannot be disclosed," 

Los Alamos National Laboratory said in a statement.



A watchdog group called Project on Government Oversight said the 

missing material consisted of two grams (0.0755 ounce) of weapons-

grade plutonium. A Los Alamos spokesman said the missing material was 

not weapons grade.



"The fact that the missing material was not reported is a violation 

of department policy and raises serious questions about the level of 

confidence in the Department of Energy's Material Control and 

Accountability System that tracks hundreds of tons of weapons grade 

nuclear material," the watchdog group said.



Los Alamos officials said they discovered the disappearance of the 

material -- two low-purity analytical samples of plutonium-oxide -- 

last Thursday and the lab is conducting a complete material 

inventory.



"This material has scientific and analytical research value, but is 

in a low hazard and threat category," said Laboratory Director Pete 

Nanos.



Lab officials believe the nuclear material was likely discarded as a 

residue through approved processes.



Nanos was recently named director of the lab that produced the first 

atomic bomb after former director John Browne stepped down. Browne's 

tenure was clouded by a number of highly publicized security 

violations, as well as scandals involving misuse of lab credit cards 

and millions of dollars in possible theft.

-------------------



TEPCO reactivates 2nd reactor in Niigata



NIIGATA, Japan, June 18 (Kyodo) - Scandal-hit Tokyo Electric Power 

Co. (TEPCO) on Wednesday afternoon reactivated the second of 17 

nuclear reactors shut down following revelations last year that it 

falsified safety reports.



Niigata Gov. Ikuo Hirayama told TEPCO and the Ministry of Economy, 

Trade and Industry (METI) of his consent to resuming operations at 

the No. 7 reactor in the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear plant in the 

prefecture.



The No. 7 reactor will start generating power for business in less 

than 50 hours following the reactivation, TEPCO officials said.



The largest Japanese utility resumed operations at the plant's No. 6 

reactor in May.



It has found no cracks in core shrouds of the two reactors in the 

plant, which lies in the city of Kashiwazaki and the town of Kariwa, 

the officials said.



TEPCO shut down the No. 7 reactor on March 29, but completed 

preparations to restart it on June 9. METI said earlier the advanced 

boiled water reactor is safe.



As for other TEPCO reactors, Fukushima Gov. Eisaku Sato is expected 

to make a decision on the No. 6 reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 plant 

after hearing opinions from residents on July 3. The government has 

declared the reactor safe.



Following the revelations in August 2002 that TEPCO falsified safety 

reports, the power company shut down all 17 of its nuclear reactors --

 seven in Niigata Prefecture and 10 in Fukushima Prefecture -- for 

safety checks in a bid to win back public trust.

---------------------



FirstEnergy delays nuke test, still sees Aug restart



SAN FRANCISCO, June 17 (Reuters) - FirstEnergy Corp. <FE.N> still 

aims to restart its troubled Davis-Besse nuclear power plant in 

August despite a delay for a critical performance test, a company 

spokesman said on Tuesday.



A weeklong test of the operating pressure and temperature in the Ohio 

plant's atomic reactor and cooling system to ensure there are no 

leaks has been pushed back to mid-July, said Todd Schneider, a 

spokesman for Akron, Ohio-based FirstEnergy.



The test had been planned for the first half of June.



"We are still aiming for a restart of the plant in August," Schneider 

said.



Davis-Besse was forced to close in February 2002 when inspectors 

discovered that boric acid leaking through cracks in the reactor 

vessel head had eaten a hole nearly all the way through the reactor's 

6-inch thick steel lid.



FirstEnergy has replaced the lid, but repairs and other work, 

including an investigation of the plant's "safety culture," have 

caused the company to miss repeated targets for resumed operations.



The company had planned to replace two pumps before the reactor test 

but instead decided to modify the pumps before the procedure, said 

Jan Strasma, a spokesman for the NRC.



The NRC has the final say on when Davis-Besse can resume commercial 

operations.



In another development, the NRC said in a letter to FirstEnergy on 

Monday that an inspection at Davis-Besse completed May 17 identified 

three cases of "very low safety significance" that violated NRC 

procedures and technical rules.



Delays in putting Davis-Besse back in operation are likely to cost 

FirstEnergy more than $400 million, including the cost of buying 

electricity to replace the plant's 925 megawatts of generating 

capacity -- power for more than 900,000 homes.

----------------------



Laos denies smuggling of radioactive material



BANGKOK, June 18 (Reuters) - Communist Laos said on Wednesday that a 

stash of radioactive caesium-137 seized by Thai police last week had 

not been smuggled through its territory.



Thai police, tipped off by U.S. customs agents, said on Friday they 

had arrested a Thai national with 30 kg (66 lb) of caesium-137, 

possibly intended for use in militant attacks in the form of a "dirty 

bomb."



Thai officials said the suspect had confessed to smuggling the 

caesium from neighbouring Laos and more was being kept there. They 

said it was believed to have originated in Russia.



But Laotian Ambassador to Thailand Hiem Phommachanh told Reuters 

authorities investigated the report and found nothing.



"This substance is not found in Laos," Hiem said. "Whenever there is 

bad news in Thailand, Laos is brought in and associated with it."



A "dirty bomb" is made of conventional explosives and salted with 

radioactive isotopes. When it explodes, it spreads radioactive 

material over a wide area.



The Thai capital Bangkok is hosting an Asia-Pacific Economic 

Cooperation (APEC) meeting from October 20-21 to be attend by world 

leaders, including U.S. President George W. Bush.



Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said on Saturday Muslim 

militants were planning attacks on embassies in Thailand to coincide 

with the summit.

------------------



Hiroshima peace group to probe depleted uranium arms in Iraq



HIROSHIMA, June 18 (Kyodo) - A group of Japanese peace activists plan 

to visit Iraq next week to investigate possible radioactive hazards 

from depleted uranium weapons used by the U.S. military during the 

Iraq war.



The four-member group, led by Haruko Moritaki, the head of a 

Hiroshima antinuclear group, plans to leave for Iraq on June 24 and 

stay in the country for 10 days.



Other members of the group include Nobuo Kazashi, a professor of Kobe 

University, and Naomi Toyota, a professional photographer who covered 

the Iraq war.



Moritaki says the fact-finding group plans to visit Baghdad and the 

southern Iraqi city Basra to survey the level of radioactivity in 

government buildings and other military targets believed to have been 

hit by depleted uranium shells.



The group also plans to take soil and water samples back to Japan for 

testing to find out whether the depleted uranium ammunition used in 

Iraq is posing health hazards to the people exposed to radioactivity.



The U.S. military uses depleted uranium-tipped shells -- known for 

their armor-piercing capability -- against tanks and other hardened 

military targets. Critics of the weapons say depleted uranium weapons 

cause ill-health and cancer among the soldiers using the weapons, the 

armies they target and civilians.

------------------------



GAO Releases Radioactive Material Report



WASHINGTON (AP) - Devices that contain radioactive material have been 

distributed - and in many cases lost - around the world, a 

congressional report said Monday.



The report by the General Accounting Office said that nearly 10 

million devices that contain radioactive material exist in the United 

States and the 49 countries responding to a survey.



Though there is limited information about the number of devices that 

have been lost, stolen or abandoned, it is estimated to be in the 

thousands worldwide, the GAO said.



The report was the GAO's second in a little over a month on 

radioactive devices. Its previous report focused on only the United 

States. Both reports were requested by Sen. Daniel Akaka, D-Hawaii.



The countries that responded to the survey said that a total of 612 

devices had been reported lost or stolen since 1995 with almost a 

third of them never recovered.



Most of the devices lost, stolen or abandoned was located in Russia, 

the GAO said. Of particular concern were hundreds of electric 

generators spread across rural Russia, containing strontium-90.



While each of these contain only small amounts of the radioisotope, 

there could be enough for a so-called ``dirty bomb'' if a number of 

generators were stripped of the material, nuclear experts warn.



The Energy Department earlier this year said discussions have been 

underway for some time with Russian officials over securing the 

generators.



The International Atomic Energy Agency estimates that as many as 110 

countries worldwide do not have adequate controls over radioactive 

devices that - if enough of them were obtained - could be used to 

build a conventional explosive device that could spread radioactive 

material.



On the Net:



General Accounting Office: http://www.gao.gov

-------------------



AMETEK and Lawrence Livermore National Lab to Commercialize Radiation 

Detection Technology for Homeland Security



PAOLI, Pa.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 18, 2003-- AMETEK, Inc. has signed 

a licensing agreement with the University of California's Lawrence 

Livermore National Laboratory to commercialize its RadScout radiation 

detection technology. AMETEK will incorporate the technology into its 

next generation of ORTEC advanced portable nuclear detection systems 

and market them as the Detective and Detective-EX.



These high-performance, high-resolution portable systems will be used 

at border crossings, cargo ship docks and transportation terminals to 

detect and differentiate between potentially dangerous radioactive 

materials and otherwise harmless radiation sources. The detectors are 

part of a suite of technologies offered by ORTEC for Homeland 

Security.



"The detectors will provide first responders, HAZMAT teams, fire 

departments, government authorities and others with the ability to 

screen objects for potentially dangerous nuclear material and 

determine quickly whether or not they pose a threat. Those include 

the more than six million cargo containers that enter the United 

States each year," notes Frank S. Hermance, Chairman and Chief 

Executive Officer of AMETEK, Inc.



"The RadScout represents a breakthrough in radiation detector 

technology by reducing existing bulky equipment into a lightweight, 

battery-powered device that can be either permanently mounted or 

fully portable," comments Dr. Michael R. Anastasio, Director of the 

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.



RadScout incorporates ORTEC's high-purity germanium detector with a 

miniaturized refrigeration system produced by Hymatic Engineering 

Ltd. Additional features of the easy-to-use RadScout include an 

internal computer with a full-function touch screen that allows for 

remote data transmission, real-time search and isotope 

identification, memory-stick storage and on-board field analysis 

capability.



ORTEC Products, a unit of AMETEK Advanced Measurement Technology, has 

more than 40 years of experience in the design and manufacture of 

highly sensitive radiation detectors that are used by government and 

industrial laboratories, nuclear facilities and medical research and 

in nuclear safeguards.



Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, founded in 1952, is a 

national security laboratory that is managed by the University of 

California for the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear 

Safety Administration.



AMETEK, Inc. (NYSE-listed, ticker symbol:AME) is a leading global 

manufacturer of electronic instruments and electric motors with 

annual sales of more than $1 billion.







-------------------------------------------------

Sandy Perle

Director, Technical

ICN Worldwide Dosimetry Service

ICN Plaza, 3300 Hyland Avenue

Costa Mesa, CA 92626



Tel:(714) 545-0100 / (800) 548-5100  Extension 2306

Fax:(714) 668-3149



E-Mail: sandyfl@earthlink.net

E-Mail: sperle@icnpharm.com



Personal Website: http://sandy-travels.com/

ICN Worldwide Dosimetry Website: http://www.dosimetry.com/



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